Police save 800 dogs from dinner plates

More than 800 dogs destined to be smuggled to Vietnam where they would be butchered and eaten, have been rescued in a police raid on a farm in north-eastern Thailand, officials said yesterday.

Authorities acting on a tip-off found the dogs crammed into small metal cages on a farm in Nakhon Phanom province, department of livestock development official Apai Suthisung said.

"The dogs were caught all over north-eastern provinces and were to be traded in exchange for consumer products like plastic tubs," he told AFP.

Six people were arrested in the raid and charged with smuggling animals out of the country, which carries a maximum two-year jail term and a fine of 40,000 baht (about $A1,420).

Licensed dog breeders can sell the creatures, but smuggling them across Thai borders is illegal, Apai said.

The dogs, many of which appeared well-groomed and in healthy condition, were to be ferried across the Mekong river to Laos before their journey to Vietnam where they would be sold for 300 to 400 baht ($A10.60 to $A14.20) each.

Dog eating has come under fire in places like South Korea, but the practice has gone unchallenged in Vietnam.

The communist country has no animal welfare organisations and no laws to protect animals from cruelty, and the practice enjoys runaway popularity in the country's north including the capital Hanoi, where streets in some neighbourhoods are lined with dogmeat restaurants.

Apai said the hundreds of rescued dogs would be taken to their new home at a Thai livestock checkpoint in Nakhon Phanom, adding that the station was already soliciting contributions to help feed the animals.